INTRODUCTION. 15 
tion from home and friends, Gop is with him, often 
unrecognized and forgotten, but surrounding him 
with mercy, protecting him and guiding him, and 
willing to cheer him by the visitations of His grace, 
and the assurance of Hislove. “IfI take the wings 
of the morning and dwell in the utmost parts of 
the sea; even there shall Thy hand lead me, and 
Thy right hand shall hold me.” 
The Ocean is the highway of commerce. God 
seems wisely and graciously to have ordained, that 
man should not be independent, but under perpetual 
obligation to his fellow-man; and that distant coun- 
tries should ever maintain a mutually-beneficial de- 
pendence on each other. He might with ease have 
made every land to produce every necessary and com- 
fort of life in ample supply for its own population ; 
in which case, considering the fallen nature of man, 
it is probable the only intercourse between foreign 
nations would have been that of mutual aggression 
and bloodshed. But he has ordered otherwise; and 
the result has béen, generally, that happy inter- 
change of benefits which constitutes commerce. It is 
lamentably true, that the evil passions of men have 
often perverted the facilities of communication for 
purposes of destruction; yet the sober verdict of 
mankind has for the most part been, that the sub- 
stantial blessings of friendly commerce are prefer- 
able to the glare of martial glory. But the trans- 
port of goods of considerable bulk and weight, or 
of such as are of a very perishable nature, would be 
so difficult by land, as very materially to increase 
their cost; while land communication between coun- 
